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A Walk around the Upper West Side

StreetFilms presents the full version of TOPP Executive Director Mark Gorton and neighbor Lisa Sladkus walk around the Upper West Side as they pointing out certain traffic calming features and road geometry changes that could be done to make the streets safer for pedestrians and cyclists.

Previously we have posted very short primers here, but today we offer the full tour, complete with many diagrams and photos, which we hope will inspire denizens of Gotham and beyond to use these ideas in their neighborhoods. So go take a walk around your block and start the transformation!

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<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Mark Gorton:</i> [00:01]
Hi, I’m Mark Gorton and I’m here today with Lisa Sladkus.
We’re both residents of the Upper West Side and we are walking around
talking about the potential for the streets of the Upper West Side if
they were transformed to be places for people rather than just conduits
for traffic. </font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Mark Gorton:</i> [00:21]
You know, why are you taking time out of your day to talk about this
stuff?</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Lisa Sladkus:</i>
[00:26] I’m interested in transportation. I studied transportation
at Columbia, but as I’ve told Mark before, I just feel really strongly
that this is a great neighbourhood and I want to make it better and
I want to live here with my family for a long, long time. </font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Lisa Sladkus:</i>
[00:44] Here we are in the corner of 71<sup>st</sup> and Broadway.
It is one of the most chaotic and confusing intersections on the Upper
West Side. You have people coming up Broadway. You have
Amsterdam connecting to Broadway and you have 71<sup>st</sup> Street,
so you have a cross street as well. As you’ll see, this is an
extra long area for people to cross. It’s a really long crosswalk
to get to the subway and the light timing is such that as soon as the
light turns green for walkers, you immediately have to start jogging.
I literally with my kids have to grab their hand and say, “we’re
running now”. </font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Mark Gorton:</i> [01:18]
The fact is that this intersection has been built to maximise traffic
flow, and the people are kind of left to take the scraps of what remain,
and it’s a pretty nasty public space. If you imagine this, this
is actually a wide open expanse, this could be an amazing public plaza.
The transit access is unbelievable. You have an express subway
stop right there. You have, you know, good bus service right here.
Why does this have to be all about cars all the time? </font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Lisa Sladkus:</i>
[01:56] So we’re standing on the corner of Amsterdam and 87<sup>th</sup>
Street. Here’s an example of two parked cars that if they were
taken away would be so much safer for the pedestrians walking and trying
to get into the crosswalk here.</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Mark Gorton:</i> [02:09]
When you push a stroller, the kids go out before your line of sight
does. It’s very hard to get around the corner without using
your kids as guinea pigs.</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Lisa Sladkus:</i>
[02:17] And even if you have the right-of-way, you have to be so careful
crossing the street with kids. If we can get rid of these two
parked cars, we’re a lot safer. </font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Mark Gorton:</i> [02:25]
The technique of removing parking near the corner so that there is better
line of sights for both pedestrians and for drivers is called daylighting,
and it’s a common technique used to improve safety in many cities
around the world. </font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Mark Gorton:</i> [02:47]
This is a very typical residential side street on the Upper West Side.
This is where people live. But the street has been designed to
encourage cars to go as fast as possible. It uses the exact same
design principles as a drag strip. We can take steps to change
the physical makeup of the streets to force cars to drive slower and
more respectfully for people. </font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Mark Gorton:</i> [03:17]
Here behind me you have a double-parked van, and it’s something that
happens so often that no-one even bothers to think about it. And
you can see this guy here, he delivers plate glass. So this is
a pretty high priority trip there, yet he’s forced to park illegally
because the curb space is so incredibly underpriced. So why are
we giving a discount on public space to a guy driving in a giant SUV
from Connecticut? </font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Lisa Sladkus:</i>
[03:49] The other thing that this double-parked car is doing is, as
we just saw bikes going by, it forces the bikes into another lane of
traffic which creates another very dangerous situation.</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Mark Gorton:</i> [04:06]
Here we are in Amsterdam Avenue which is just a massive traffic highway
right in the middle of the Upper West Side. I mean the Upper West
Side is a residential neighbourhood and this street has been designed
without any consideration for the people that live around here and it’s
all about moving traffic. And it is just an unpleasant street
to be near. I have to walk my kids to nursery school down this
street, we walk a half mile down Amsterdam, you can’t even talk to
them because it’s so loud. If we change our policies, we can
reduce the level of traffic on Amsterdam enormously.</font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Lisa Sladkus:</i>
[04:53] Here we are on Broadway, a bus lane area of the Upper West Side,
and as you can see, a very heavily trafficked pedestrian area.
We have gourmet grocery store, we have booksellers, we have people walking
their strollers and their bikes, and this is an example of if we could
widen the sidewalk even more, think about how many more people we could
accommodate and how much more community we could generate. </font></p>
<p> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"></font></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman"><i>Mark Gorton:</i> [05:18]
You have a space right here that if I stand here by myself, it’s hard
for anyone else to get through, like look at this, you know, it’s
basically one arm’s width across. Yet we have this giant expansive
roadway which has room for one set of parked cars, a truck to double-park,
a bus to get through and another set of cars here. I mean there
is no-one in these cars, no-one is benefiting right now from these cars
being here, yet all the people are being squeezed on that sidewalk.
We have a perverse allocation of public space on the Upper West Side
and it needs to be changed. </font> <br></p>
<p><font size="3" face="Times New Roman">[music]</font> <br></p>
http://transcriptdivas.ca/transcription-canada/

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Great film, one question, I thought the narrowing of the street at intersections to shorten the crosswalk was called a neckdown, I'm not familiar with the term daylighting.

cclark

Lee-You are right-narrowing the street at intersections is a neckdown (and can also be called a curb extension). Daylighting simply refers to opening up visibility at corners by removing one parking space. This can be accomplished in a number of ways including striping, coloring the curb or adding signage to indicate that parking is not allowed. It can also be accomplished by extending the curb (which of course wipes out one parking spot). These terms are similar, but aren't exactly the same. Hope that clears it up!

anonymous

the idea of involving local communities via video in re-imagining street-scapes is a great one.

but it would be great to see some new faces and neighborhoods featured on StreetFilms. livable streets is a citywide issue and should be treated as such if this message is going to resonate.

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